"The task of exegetical interpretation and also
of biblical theology is not to restate the meaning of the Old
Testament texts in ways which would be appropriate and meaningful
to the ancient Israelites-but to us. As did the Israelites,
we can find that the greatest service rendered by tradition is not
its retention of answers to old questions-but its inadequacy to
provide us with simple solutions to our own new problems.
Precisely this challenge, coming at the nexus where the past and
the future meet the present, is the locus of revelation."